Countrywide CEO Earned $132 Million In 2007

CALABASAS, Calif. — A securities filing shows Countrywide Financial Corp. CEO Angelo Mozilo earned about $10.8 million in total compensation and cashed out $121.5 million in stock options last year.

The compensation disclosed in the Securities and Exchange Commission filing released Thursday represents a nearly 80 percent cut from the 70-year-old's 2006 pay of about $51 million.

The Calabasas-based company reported a yearly loss of $704 million in 2007 amid the nationwide mortgage market meltdown.

It agreed in January to be acquired by Bank of America Corp. for $4.1 billion in stock.

The SEC has been scrutinizing the timing of Mozilo's stock sales. Mozilo has said he's cooperating with the inquiry and has denied making any improper trades.

Comments

[CaptainHowdy]

MAN, that guy is creepy looking.

[mamacat]

Looks like the Republican philosophy of deregulating everything is working just the way they want it to.
All they have to do is spend a few hundred million dollars every year keeping the public away from the truth, focused on non-issues, and they are free to rape our country for hundreds of billions. It seems to me that honest business men and women should reject the new Republican party that Reagan helped create. I don't care what they embrace instead, but honest, hard working people should definitely reject today's GOP.

[totalliberal]

Maybe we should listen to George Soros's suggestion. By helping out the homeowners who have been conned by these rapscallions we would have far fewer homes on the market. Fewer homes on the market would have kept real-estate prices steady and people would still have roofs over their heads and some equity.
But then Bushco has never been successful at anything they do.

[peepeeray]

The American Way = privatized profits, socialized losses, and make sure the bitter people have plenty of guns and religion to cling onto. Just don't say that last part publically or you'll catch hell for it.

[gakabani]

This is pure corporate fascism.

[mediamarv]

So who gets the 4Billion?? Does he get any of that too???

This is republican heaven... top CEOs making all they can rake in, people who actually work losing homes.
What a great country this is under Repugnant rule!!

[totalliberal]

I believe this can now be called the Bush "trickle-across", economic theory.

[totalliberal]

Snipes goes to jail for a few million. This turd gets hundreds of millions for blowing/stealing billions. Republican economics of scale.
Bush has now blown trillions (toward his friends), wonder what his reward will be?

[scottyboi84]

Maybe he should take a modest 1 million dollar salary and donate the rest to the company of his that is failing. With over 700 million dollars in loss, 100 + million dollars would certainly help. How greedy can one person be? What do you do with that amount of money besides sit on it and keep it from other people who probably deserve it more than him anyways.

[swift_goat_pet_for_truth]

GREAT NEWS!!!

Now all I gotta do is wait until some of it trickles down...

[Novista]

And another thing ...

Does no one remember that last September, the government bailout of Countrywide was $51.1 billion? And Bank of America will buy Countrywide for $4 billion. Eh?

"Countrywide"s advances from the Atlanta-based FHLB bank had soared 81 percent, to a total of $51 billion."

from this blog of last November:

http://loanworkout.org/2007/11/28/fast-sleezy-schumer-is-on-mozillos-a-big-time/

I remember Senator Charles Schumer was "asking questions" of Mozilo. What happened with that?

[mamacat]

If the government had to bail his company out with billions of dollars, but it still went under, how in the world does he justify paying himself $132 million? If I let a small business go bankrupt, all I get is a tax break, maybe, on my losses. What he has done certainly has the appearance of outright theft. Is this even legal in our system? Why isn't the Attorney General all over this guy, trying to get the taxpayers' money back?

How many other fat cats at this company took our money and paid themselves obscenely large amounts while the company they were supposed to be overseeing went belly-up? Anyone want to take a bet that the money he took is already in some overseas bank, now untouchable? Maybe he would trade jail time for giving the money back.

I have the feeling that there was a time in our history when this sort of behaviour was not allowed.
Welcome to the New Republican era.

[WIpatriot]

Same thing that always happens.....a lot of huff and puff and then. all of a sudden, nothing.

[OntheContrary]

I like to be a CEO. Where do I sign up. Oops, sorry you are not in the 'Old boys network.' No wonder corporate America is in decline.

[sklfcats]

HE should sped some of his hard (ly) earned money and do something about his overdone fake suntan.

[OnceProudAmerican]

Smells like another Buyout in the works.
When are Stockholders and Co officals going to start holding these Bastards accountable? After Enron you think we would put a stop to this Crap.
Maybe the stockholders DESERVE the hosing they're receiving?

[zizyphus]

Looks like a gangster, gangster vibes.

[bikerdude]

Wonder if, for all that money, he did anything to improve their product or customer satisfaction. I suspect what he did was cut costs and fiddle with their investments. I am sick of all that money going to someone who basically failed at their job. What IS the job description for such an opportunist? On what basis is he given bonuses and perks? Too much of this is hidden, especially in a public company.

[bikerdude]

Somebody on that board of directors needs to ask the tough questions. Perhaps these loser boards should have to appoint a shareholder ombudsman who can flag this shit before it goes too far. Of course that whole end of the spectrum couldn't care less about honesty, ethics or competence. Its all about the stock price and those quarterly numbers. Destroy the company or the workforce, but don't miss that number...

[jukesgrrl]

How about a low-level-employee ombudsman? These are the people who get screwed the worst by CEO malfeasance, since they're usually stockholders, too. They lose their jobs, their pensions, AND their savings. I'd love to hear what, oh, say, a former Enron secretary would say to Mrs. Ken Lay. Where IS she, by the way, getting a massage at the spa, or in Bolivia with Kenny-Boy?

[Podewumun]

Whenever I see a picture of this guy, I'm overcome by an insane urge to hose him down and scrub him mercilessly using lye soap and a stiff bristled brush.

[HamletsMill]

He seems to be covered in that spray on or cotton ball pad on fake tanning stuff my oldest sister used to put on when she was a cheerleader in high school in the early sixties. As i remember it took and hour to dry. Or is that stuff banned these days. Anyway, this guy looks flea dipped in it. Is that "uber tan" LOOK supposed to turn on women in the sub-prime lending CEO party circles these days?

[Podewumun]

I'm guessing he spent most of his time in a Wolff tanning bed he had installed in his penthouse office.

He sure wasn't doing any work, that's for sure.

[dctackett]

I think the heading is off... "Countrywide CEO Earned $132 Million In 2007"...
EARNED?...
I could think of several other words, but EARNED?

[MoeJava]

I agree... should be "stolen in the form of compensation"

[TXfemmom]

Alright, this guy was involved in a criminal interprise which committed crimes. Freeze the money, under RICCO and investigate he and the company and convict him of it.

[ranger5]

American business has been totally enronized for years now. The Bush team has made sure that nothing like serious oversight occured over the past 7 years. The large corporations that used to serve people now exist solely to make a profit. Remember when insurance companies primary function was to actually provide insurance? Remember when banks provided a safe place to keep your money instead of create a trillion ways to tack on innumerable fees and keep people in as much debt at possible. Remember when investment managers actually tried to make your money grow without exposing you to unacceptable risk? The consumer is absolutely on the bottom rung of the ladder these days. The consumer exists solely as a huge cash cow to be milked regardless of ethics or legality. The slick MBA masters of the universe have enriched themselves and brought the American economy, and the American consumer, to the brink of disaster.

[OnceProudAmerican]

Remember when Reagan "Deregulated" buisnesses?
It's like they turned the kids loose in the candy store! Since then everyone is getting hit buy it now.
Look at the Airlines and the Economy both are FUBARed beyond repair.
It's going to take years to correct this clusterf#@ck up!

[Trueheart]

Makes the Worst Person in the World Nominee list for sure
Read: Orange One is No Longer Glowing.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/feb/01/subprimecrisis.useconomy

[robbor]

you don't get it, $132 million is chump change, had he had a good year his take would have been close to a billion. believe me, he's feeling rather down right now.

[bikerdude]

How does a family even spend $132 million a year? Maybe it all goes to "trickle down"...What a sick joke these people are.

[NABNYC]

It's called looting the business. All the CEOs do it, along with upper management. Bob Rubin was paid $30 million in 2007 by Citicorp, a company which today is facing layoffs and hard times. If the upper management did not the loot the businesses, strip them bare of assets selling off everything not bolted to the ground and stashing their money off-shore, we would not be faced with our current economic problems.

Our government can stop this practice by making it illegal for any business to write off any consideration paid to a person (including retirement, health, stock options) in excess of $250,000 per year, and taxing all income above $250,000 per year at 90%. If the business can't write it off because it is defined as not a "reasonable" business expense, they won't pay it. And if they pay it anyway, then the business will be taxed on the amount paid in excess of $250,000 at ordinary income rates, as well the management person receiving the money. If they insist on doing it, we take the money and put it somewhere to save our country.

[bikerdude]

NABNYC, I like your logic. If they are going to take that kind of money out of a public company, then they must publicly account for it.

[ruleoflaw66]

And I'll bet it's not deposited in the Bank Of America.

[Podewumun]

Or Wachovia.

[WIpatriot]

Or Citi...

[richardgordon]

Huston we have a problem! If a man like Angelo Mozilo can get away with making 132 Million dollars by wrecking the American ecconomy you've got to ask yourselves a fundamental question: Is not the current American way of doing business flawed?

[YankeeCanuck]

Excellent question. Here's another one. How can the ex-CEO of United Health walk away with roughly $1.4 billion (after giving back $620 million of back-dated stock options? For a heckuva job taking in money for health insurance and shuffling it around while the company takes zero risk all the while denying coverage to those who need it?

"Flawed" is too kind a description for the American way of doing business, perhaps.